Six endings for every verb, and a single exception: être.
The French imparfait is the past tense for descriptions and habits, and for an action that was in progress when something else happened. It is also one of the most regular tenses in French: one way to find the stem, one set of endings.
This guide shows how to form the imparfait for any verb, the spelling traps of a few verb groups, and when to use it rather than the passé composé.
The imparfait looks at a past action from the inside, without its beginning or end. In English it often becomes "was doing" or "used to do", and sometimes a plain past: il faisait froid, it was cold.
Il pleuvait. Nous habitions à Lyon. Elle lisait quand je suis entré. None of these sentences says when the rain, the stay in Lyon or the reading stopped.
Take the present tense nous form, remove -ons, and you have the stem. It works for regular and irregular verbs alike:
Once you know the present tense nous form of a verb, you know its imparfait.
The endings are the same for all verbs, with no exception:
| Subject | Ending | parler | finir | avoir |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| je | -ais | parlais | finissais | avais |
| tu | -ais | parlais | finissais | avais |
| il, elle, on | -ait | parlait | finissait | avait |
| nous | -ions | parlions | finissions | avions |
| vous | -iez | parliez | finissiez | aviez |
| ils, elles | -aient | parlaient | finissaient | avaient |
Four of the six forms sound the same: parlais, parlais, parlait and parlaient are all pronounced like parlè. Only the subject tells you which spelling to write.
Être is the one verb whose stem does not come from the nous form (nous sommes has no -ons). Its stem is ét-, with the usual endings: j'étais, tu étais, il était, nous étions, vous étiez, ils étaient.
Impersonal verbs have no nous form at all, so they are learned directly: il faut becomes il fallait, il pleut becomes il pleuvait.
A few verb groups change their spelling before the endings that start with a:
The double i of nous étudiions looks like a typo, but it is the regular stem étudi- plus the ending -ions.
The imparfait has a handful of clear uses:
| Use | Example | In English |
|---|---|---|
| Description in the past | La maison était grande et il faisait chaud. | The house was big and it was hot. |
| Habit or repeated action | Le dimanche, nous allions chez ma grand-mère. | On Sundays we used to go to my grandmother's. |
| Action in progress | Je lisais quand le téléphone a sonné. | I was reading when the phone rang. |
| Hypothesis after si | Si j'avais le temps, je viendrais. | If I had time, I would come. |
| Polite request | Je voulais vous demander un conseil. | I wanted to ask you for some advice. |
After si, the imparfait pairs with the conditional, which itself uses the imparfait endings on the future stem: je viendrais, nous parlerions. The page on future or conditional covers that pairing.
The passé composé tells what happened, a completed event. The imparfait sets the scene around it. In Je lisais quand le téléphone a sonné, the reading is the background (imparfait) and the ring is the event (passé composé).
Ask yourself whether the action moves the story forward or describes the situation. The rule page imparfait or passé composé goes through the harder cases, with time markers such as soudain or tout à coup.
The silent endings are the hardest part in a dictation. In Apostrophe·, a wrong ending shows up in the word-by-word correction, with the rule that explains it.
Take the nous form, drop -ons, add -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient. Être uses ét-. Use the imparfait to describe, for habits and for actions in progress, and keep the passé composé for the events.
What are the imparfait endings?
They are -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez and -aient, for every verb. Je, tu, il and ils forms sound the same, so the subject decides the spelling.
How do you form the imparfait in French?
Take the present tense nous form, remove -ons and add the endings. Nous finissons gives je finissais, nous prenons gives je prenais.
Is être irregular in the imparfait?
Yes, it is the only one. Its stem is ét-: j'étais, nous étions, ils étaient. The endings stay regular.
What is the difference between the imparfait and the passé composé?
The passé composé reports a completed event. The imparfait describes the background, a habit or an action in progress at that moment.
Does the imparfait always mean used to?
No. Used to fits habits, but the imparfait also translates was doing, or a simple past for descriptions: il faisait beau, the weather was nice.
Apostrophe· reads you a sentence, corrects it word by word, and explains the exact rule behind each mistake.
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